A new super PAC connected to a network of nonpartisan political action committees put roughly $146,000 behind Democratic House candidates this week ahead of competitive primary elections later this month.

Progress Tomorrow, Inc., a super PAC created in late June, has spent about $77,900 supporting Democrat Joe Radinovich in Minnesota’s 8th District House primary since July 27, according to Federal Election Commission (FEC) reports filed this week. The super PAC has also spent about $68,600 backing incumbent Rep. Darren Soto (D-Fla.) in Florida’s 9th District House primary.

Progress Tomorrow, which was created on June 28, has reported raising $1.35 million from only two super PACs: United Together and Forward Not Back. These three super PACs appear to be connected to a larger network of groups reportedly orchestrated by No Labels, a nonpartisan 501(c)(4) organization aimed at promoting bipartisanship in Congress.

The three PACs involved in the Minnesota and Florida election spending share the same treasurer, Bruce Goren. United Together and Forward Not Back were created on the same day in March 2017, according to FEC filings, and both are based in Charlotte, North Carolina.

OpenSecrets has identified two additional PACs with links to No Labels, including No Labels Action, Inc., a super PAC created in June that has received nearly $2.5 million from four other PACs with connections to the nonprofit. Clarine Nardi Riddle, a former Connecticut attorney general who helped found the organization, is No Labels Action’s treasurer.

Patriotic Americans PAC, an eighth super PAC, also appears to be connected to No Labels, according to an OpenSecrets analysis of recent FEC filings. Patriotic Americans, based in Charlotte, received $600,000 from Citizens for a Strong America and shares a treasurer with two PACs that contributed to No Labels Action. That treasurer, Ruth Rochelle Stoner, is the co-chair of No Labels’ Minnesota chapter, according to the Rapid City Journal.

Patriotic Americans on Wednesday reported spending more than $88,400 to support GOP candidate Steve Watkins in Kansas’ 2nd District House race.

No Labels began in 2010 as a movement to promote bipartisan policymaking in Congress. The organization eventually helped inspire the creation of the House Problem Solvers Caucus, a group of 48 representatives from both sides of the aisle that share No Labels’ goal of fostering bipartisan problem-solving. Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-N.J.) and Rep. Tom Reed (R-N.Y.) are the current caucus co-chairs.

No Labels did not respond to a request for comment on this story.

Combined, the eight super PACs connected to No Labels have raised more than $9.8 million in itemized individual donations, primarily from five- and six-figure donors. Chicago White Sox and Bulls owner Jerry Reinsdorf, hedge fund manager Louis Bacon, former Major League Baseball Commissioner Allan Selig and Wheels Inc. executive Jim Frank are among the handful of donors who contributed to two or more of the eight PACs. Fox News CEO Rupert Murdoch has also contributed $500,000 to United Together, one of the super PACs funding Progress Tomorrow.

The smallest donations came from Andrew Bursky, a No Labels co-founder. He made $1,000 donations to six of the PACs with links to the nonprofit, though his contributions to Patriotic Americans, Govern Or Go Home and United Together were refunded earlier this year.

The super PACs have spent more than $3 million supporting and opposing candidates of both parties in the 2018 election cycle.

United for Progress, Inc., spent more than $931,600 opposing Democrat Marie Newman in Illinois’ 3rd District House primary. It spent more than $44,200 supporting her opponent, incumbent Rep. Daniel Lipinski, who won the primary.

United Together spent more than $148,700 supporting Democrat John Morganelli in Pennsylvania’s 7th District House primary. It spent nearly $234,000 opposing two other Democrats in the race, including Susan Wild, who won the primary.

Forward Not Back spent more than $253,200 supporting Democrat Damon Martinez in New Mexico’s 1st District House primary. It spent more than $38,500 opposing two other Democrats in the race, including Debra Haaland, who won the primary.

Citizens for a Strong America spent nearly $337,800 opposing Republican House candidate Diego Morales in Indiana’s 4th District House race. Morales lost to Indiana state legislator Jim Baird in May, who was also the target of nearly $18,700 in opposition spending by the super PAC.

Progress Tomorrow’s spending in Minnesota and Florida comes just weeks before competitive primaries in both states.

Radinovich, a member of Minnesota’s Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party, which is affiliated with the Democratic Party, will face four other DFL candidates in the state’s Aug. 14 primary. The winner of the primary will go head-to-head against a GOP candidate in November to fill the House seat vacated by Rep. Rick Nolan (D-Minn.), who is running for lieutenant governor.

Soto, an incumbent Democrat in Florida’s 9th Congressional District, is facing a primary challenge from former Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.). Florida’s primaries are on Aug. 28.

Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.) introduced legislation that would overturn the decision and increase nonprofit transparency requirements. Gov. Steve Bullock (D-Mont.) filed a lawsuit in a Montana Federal District Court that would prevent the administration from implementing the new rules.

The Treasury Department announced last week that it would no longer require certain nonprofit organizations, such as 501(c)(4) groups, to disclose identifying information about their donors to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). The move, which the department said will save resources and prevent the accidental release of confidential information, could allow groups like the National Rifle Association and Planned Parenthood to pour “dark money” into nationwide elections with less government oversight than before.

Tester’s legislation, dubbed the Spotlight Act, would effectively reverse the department’s new rules. The Spotlight Act would also require 501(c)(4), 501(c)(5) and 501(c)(6) groups to disclose to the IRS and the public the names of donors who contribute more than $5,000. Those groups do not have to release the names of any donors under current laws, which is why many politically active nonprofits are called “dark money” groups.

Bullock’s lawsuit, first reported by The New York Times, claims the IRS and Treasury Department unlawfully interfered with Montana’s ability to gather the data it needs to manage its tax laws. The suit also claims the Trump administration did not follow the Administrative Procedure Act, which requires agencies such as the Treasury Department to provide opportunities for public comment before changing policies.

Bullock’s litigation is seeking to nullify the new IRS rules, according to court documents.

Tester and Bullock have both been champions of campaign finance reform that increases election transparency. Tester has introduced multiple campaign finance reform plans, including a proposed constitutional amendment declaring that corporations are not people and a bill that would require senators to file campaign finance disclosures electronically.

Bullock helped push legislation in Montana that requires independent groups to disclose their donors if they spend money in state elections, regardless of the group’s tax status. He also signed an executive order requiring recipients of government contracts to disclose dark money spending in Montana elections.

]]>Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez boosted by out-of-state donors after primary winhttps://www.opensecrets.org/news/2018/07/alexandria-ocasio-cortez-boosted-by-out-of-state-donors-after-primary-win/
Tue, 24 Jul 2018 19:44:27 +0000https://www.opensecrets.org/news/?p=26994More than 70 percent of itemized donations to Ocasio-Cortez's campaign came from out-of-state contributors in the four days after her June primary win.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the 28-year-old Democratic House candidate who upset Rep. Joe Crowley in New York’s 14th District race, saw an explosion of out-of-state campaign contributions in the days after she won the primary in June, according to a Federal Election Commission (FEC) report filed last week.

In the four days between her primary win and the end of June, Ocasio-Cortez raked in more than $70,000 from out-of-state donors who contributed more than $200, according to an OpenSecrets analysis of her FEC filings. That’s more than a quarter of all itemized donations she received in June and about 71 percent of the roughly $99,400 in itemized donations she collected in the days after her victory over Crowley.

Corbin Trent, Ocasio-Cortez’s communications director, said the primary win helped put Ocasio-Cortez on a national stage and that her victory speech on June 26 inspired people nationwide.

“And that was reflected in the donors,” Trent said.

Of Ocasio-Cortez’s itemized donations that OpenSecrets could analyze by geographic location, about 55 percent have come from contributors outside New York state this election cycle. Donors in California contributed almost $52,000 to her campaign in June, making the Golden State the largest source of out-of-state funds last month.

Committees are not required to report geographic or identifying information about donors who contribute $200 or less. But about 37 percent of Ocasio-Cortez’s $861,699 in total reported fundraising has come from individual donors who have given more than $200 to her campaign, allowing observers to get a glimpse of who is bankrolling her congressional bid and where that money is coming from.

The 28-year-old has relied primarily on small individual donors. Roughly 62 percent of individual contributions to Ocasio-Cortez’s campaign were $200 or less. By contrast, Crowley, who has represented the 14th Congressional District since 2013, took in more than 97 percent of his roughly $1.1 million in total individual contributions this election cycle from donations larger than $200.

About 6 percent of Ocasio-Cortez’s itemized contributions have come from the 14th Congressional District, which includes parts of Queens and the Bronx in New York City. The city was Ocasio-Cortez’s largest source of funds by metro area. She brought in at least $138,000 from New Yorkers, with Manhattan’s Upper West Side and Chelsea neighborhoods being her most lucrative zip codes.

Ocasio-Cortez shunned corporate PACs, but her campaign accepted $10,000 from two progressive PACs: MoveOn.org and Justice Democrats. Both PACs contributed $5,000 each to Ocasio-Cortez’s campaign.

Trent said those groups and other progressive organizations have sent emails urging their members to support Ocasio-Cortez’s campaign. Those groups have nationwide membership, which Trent said could also be a reason why the campaign has seen donations from regions across the country.

At the start of my run for Congress, I publicly pledged to reject all corporate PAC money.

That’s because I didn’t want anything to get between my community and my advocacy.

Since her primary win, Ocasio-Cortez has appeared repeatedly on national media outlets and has plans to campaign with other Democrats outside New York state. She campaigned with Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-V.T.) in Kansas in mid-July and is scheduled to attend rallies with Michigan gubernatorial candidate Abdul El-Sayed at the end of the month.

Ocasio-Cortez’s campaign has spent just over $593,000 this election cycle and has more than $268,000 in cash on hand as of June 30.

The Treasury Department announced Monday that it will no longer require certain nonprofit organizations to disclose identifying information about their donors to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).

The policy change, which Treasury Department officials say will save public and government resources and prevent the accidental release of confidential information, will allow politically active nonprofits to pour anonymous “dark money” into elections with even less government oversight than they already face.

Groups impacted by the move include the National Rifle Association (NRA), Planned Parenthood, the Koch-aligned Americans for Prosperity and labor unions. Those organizations are commonly referred to as “dark money” groups because they are not required to publicly disclose the sources of funding that has been used to support political causes.

501(c)(3) and 527 organizations are not covered by the policy change and will still be required to report information about their donors to the IRS.

The IRS’s announcement came the same day a Russian national was arrested for allegedly trying to use connections in the NRA to influence US politics. Though the agent was not charged with using foreign money to sway elections, Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), the ranking Democrat on the Senate Finance Committee, said the IRS’s decision would make it easier for foreign donors to illegally funnel money into US races.

Trump’s @USTreasury has made it EASIER for anonymous foreign donors to funnel dark money into nonprofits THE SAME DAY a Russian national linked to the @NRA was arrested for trying to influence our elections.

Wyden said he would not vote for President Donald Trump’s nominee for IRS commissioner, Charles Rettig, unless Rettig promised to reinstate the disclosure requirements. The Senate Finance Committee is expected to vote on Rettig’s nomination on Thursday.

All nonprofits must continue to disclose their form 990s and limited donor information to the public upon request, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said in a statement Monday. Observers can view the size and number of individual donations in form 990’s “schedule B” section, but the names and addresses of those donors are often redacted.

The IRS acknowledged in its statement announcing the change that it had sometimes accidentally released confidential donor information. In 2013, the IRS posted unredacted tax forms revealing donors to the nonprofit Republican Governors Association Public Policy Committee, the Center for Public Integrity reported at the time.

Dark money groups themselves mistakenly provided observers with unredacted schedule B forms. In April, OpenSecrets was provided an unredacted schedule B form showing that megadonor Robert Mercer wrote a $2 million check to Secure America Now, a secretive group that worked with Facebook and Google to target swing voters with anti-Muslim ads.

The median net worth of U.S. Supreme Court justices was $4.6 million in 2017. That means Brett Kavanaugh — one of President Donald Trump’s reported frontrunners to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy — may have the lightest wallet if he’s appointed to the court of last resort.

Kavanaugh’s most recent personal financial disclosure, which OpenSecrets obtained Friday, shows him reporting between $15,000 and $65,000 in his bank and retirement accounts. That would make him one of the Supreme Court’s least wealthy justices if he’s picked by Trump and confirmed by the Senate.

Kavanaugh, a federal appellate court judge who clerked for Kennedy and worked on the special counsel investigation of former President Bill Clinton, is among Trump’s top picks for the seat left vacant when Kennedy announced his retirement earlier this month, NPR reported.

The current Supreme Court justices have relatively thick wallets: Kennedy, whose average net worth was $890,000, was the only justice with an estimated average net worth below $1 million. Justice Neil Gorsuch, Trump’s most recent appointee, had an estimated net worth of between $3.6 and $10 million in 2017, according to financial disclosures obtained by OpenSecrets Friday.

﻿Other top contenders for Kennedy’s spot include Amy Barrett, a University of Notre Dame professor that Trump appointed to the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals last year, and Raymond Kethledge, a 6th Circuit Court of Appeals judge.

Kavanaugh’s only reported liability is a loan he took out from contributions he made to his federal employee retirement savings plan, which totals up to $15,000, according to the financial disclosure.

But just because Kavanaugh’s financial disclosure covering 2017 shows him with a maximum of $65,000 in assets doesn’t mean he’s financially underwater. Kavanaugh’s salary as a D.C. circuit judge is $220,600. He earned another $27,490 teaching at Harvard Law School. It’s unclear, though, where his salary is being deposited.

Judges are not required to disclose mortgages, equity loans, or lines of credit on personal residences, vehicles, boats or motor homes, so the exact value of Kavanaugh’s total assets is unknown. Judges are required to disclose property that isn’t a primary residence, but Kavanaugh doesn’t appear to own property beyond his Maryland home, valued at nearly $1 million, according to Montgomery County property records.

Barrett, one of the other reported frontrunners for Kennedy’s seat, has disclosed finances that more closely resemble those of the other current justices. Her total net worth is more than $1.5 million, according to an OpenSecrets review of her most recent financial disclosure covering 2016 through April 2017, which was obtained by Fix the Court, a nonpartisan organization that advocates for increased Supreme Court transparency.

The former Notre Dame professor has about $1.7 million invested in securities and real estate, according to the disclosure, and most of that money is in various mutual and investment funds. She reported an income of approximately $475,000 between 2015 and 2017, according to her disclosure. Her university salary made up most of her income.

Barrett, whom liberals fear may help overturn Roe v. Wade, also has ties to The Federalist Society, an influential group of lawyers and legal activists that pushes to appoint conservatives to federal court positions. Barrett took in $7,000 from The Federalist Society as an “honorarium,” according to the disclosure.

The Federalist Society, which helped push Gorsuch’s appointment, has already begun working on Trump’s next Supreme Court pick. Leonard Leo, the Federalist Society’s executive vice president, met with Senate Republicans last week to discuss the Supreme Court, according to media reports. He’s also helped secure funding for the Judicial Crisis Network (JCN), a nondisclosing 501(c)(4) nonprofit that is bankrolling a seven-figure ad buy in support of Trump’s eventual nominee to replace Kennedy, POLITICO reported.

JCN is connected to BH Group LLC, an apparent shell company that gave $1 million to Trump’s inaugural committee, OpenSecrets reported.

Kethledge, the 6th Circuit Court judge on Trump’s list of potential nominees, has a net worth of between $100,000 and $280,000, according to an OpenSecrets review of his most recent financial disclosure, obtained by Fix the Court. He also reported roughly $27,500 in income from teaching at the University of Michigan and about $3,000 in income from a book publishing royalty advance, according to his disclosure.

Trump is expected to announce his nominee to replace Kennedy on Monday.

Public-sector labor unions can’t force nonmembers to pay fees, the Supreme Court ruled on Wednesday, in a decision that could cripple unions’ abilities to spend money on political activities that usually benefit Democrats.

The ruling against labor marked a major victory for anti-union groups and conservative donors who bankrolled Janus’s litigation in the hopes of stifling union influence.

Legal observers had long expected the Supreme Court to side with Mark Janus, an Illinois state government employee who filed a suit claiming the local American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) union’s mandatory fair share fees violated his free speech rights. Janus, who is not a union member, argued the mandatory fees are unconstitutional because they are used to lobby and contribute to political causes he does not support.

Fair share fees were already banned in 28 “right-to-work” states. But in states without right-to-work laws, unions could impose fees on all workers who benefit from employee contract negotiations, even if workers weren’t members. The ruling outlaws those fees nationwide and could deprive public-sector unions of nonmember income.

“The intention of the right-wing funders of the legal effort is most certainly to reduce union political activity,” said Jeff Hauser, executive director of the Revolving Door Project at the Center for Economic and Policy Research, who has worked with labor unions. Unions’ direct political expenditures are likely to drop in the short-run because of the ruling, he said.

Total labor sector contributions have consistently topped $135 million in each election since 2012, according to an OpenSecrets analysis. Spending peaked in 2016, when labor poured nearly $217 million into elections nationwide. Most of that money went to Democrats, and the AFSCME itself has historically backed Democratic candidates.

In the 2016 races, almost all of AFSCME’s more than $1.7 million in candidate contributions went to Democrats, including Hillary Clinton. The breakdown is similar in the 2018 election cycle — more than 99 percent of its $1.1 million in candidate contributions so far have gone to Democrats.

The AFSCME also contributes millions of dollars to liberal outside spending groups.

The union has given roughly $3.6 million to outside spending groups in the 2018 election cycle alone. More than 70 percent of that spending has gone to a super PAC called For Our Future, which was formed by labor unions to support Democratic candidates. Sky Gallegos, who is listed as For Our Future’s treasurer, is the Democratic National Convention Committee’s deputy CEO for intergovernmental affairs.

The union gave just over $11 million to outside spending groups in 2016, and about half those contributions went to For Our Future.

The AFSCME has lobbied Congress on right-to-work policies, according to lobbying disclosures. The union’s lobbying efforts overall have totaled than $2.3 million annually since 2009, peaking at $2.9 million in spending in 2011.

Who backed Janus?

Because most labor money is steered toward Democrats, it should be no surprise conservative donors and anti-labor interest groups backed Janus in a courtroom battle that could cripple union lobbying and campaign spending efforts.

Tom McCabe, CEO of the Freedom Foundation, an anti-union think and action tank with reported connections to conservative donors that include the Koch brothers, has said a ruling in Janus’s favor could have “huge” consequences for unions’ political contributions.

“Imagine tens, even hundreds, of millions of dollars currently used to push damaging left-wing causes and candidates … vanishing,” McCabe said in a Freedom Foundation mailer, which was obtained and published by the Guardian in May.

The Freedom Foundation wasn’t the only group involved in the case. The Liberty Justice Center, one of the parties that represented Janus in court, received $800,000 in recent years from a policy institute funded by Richard Uihlein, an anti-union megadonor, according to tax forms reviewed by OpenSecrets. Uihlein is an Illinois businessman who has spent millions of dollars supporting Republican candidates such as Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner and former Alabama Supreme Court Justice Roy Moore, the New York Times reported in February.

Uihlein has also given more than $1 million to groups like the Federalist Society, which works to appoint conservatives to federal court positions, according to the New York Times. And he’s a major donor to the Illinois Policy Institute, a research organization that helped get Janus’s case off the ground and is closely connected to the Liberty Justice Center, the newspaper reported.

Though the Supreme Court ruling for Janus could curb union political activity in the short-run, Hauser said the possible long-term effects are unclear. Conservative donors’ efforts to weaken unions might even backfire and inspire labor members to become more active, he said.

“This could definitely be a situation in which there ends up being a little bit of an irony,” Hauser said, adding that public employee activism outside the context of a stronger union might grow rather than fade.

Teachers in right-to-work states like West Virginia and Arizona have still mounted successful campaigns to raise wages despite those states’ relatively weaker unions and voters’ general anti-labor sentiments, he said. Public opinion in those states has tended to side with the protesting teachers, he added.

“The public employee unrest across the country I think suggests (union opponents) really might be awakening a part of civil society that they don’t really want to awaken,” Hauser said.

]]>Here’s what you need to know about shell companies and foreign election spendinghttps://www.opensecrets.org/news/2018/06/shell-companies-foreign-election-spending/
Tue, 26 Jun 2018 17:09:19 +0000https://www.opensecrets.org/news/?p=26755Sheila Krumholz, executive director of the Center for Responsive Politics, will be called to testify on shell companies in a Senate hearing on Tuesday.

Before the Federal Election Commission (FEC) scuttled a rulemaking to address foreign spending in United States elections last month, Vice Chair Ellen Weintraub pleaded with the two Republican commissioners to approve the proposal.

“We are receiving information from a variety of public and private sources that indicate that we should be seriously concerned about (foreign) people trying to influence the elections in 2018, and spending serious money to do it,” Weintraub said, shortly before the commission voted the proposal down for the third time since 2016.

The Republican commissioners said they wanted to wait to vote on the rulemaking until officials released more information about foreign interference in U.S. elections. But foreign actors could try, and have tried, to influence U.S. elections through various campaign finance loopholes that allow donors to go undisclosed.

Sheila Krumholz, executive director of the Center for Responsive Politics, will be called to testify on one of those loopholes — shell companies — in a Senate Subcommittee on Crime and Terrorism hearing on Tuesday. The hearing, which will be led by Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), will focus on the role of shell companies and virtual currencies as avenues for foreign interference in U.S. elections.

Funneling donations through shell companies is one of the many ways donors can spend money in politics without public disclosure. Some donors have set up limited liability companies (LLCs), often used by businesses for favorable tax treatment, as shell companies to contribute to political causes below the radar.

Non-corporate LLCs that donate to candidates or PACs are supposed to report to the intended recipient the names of the people responsible for donations. But many LLCs don’t do that, as OpenSecrets reported last year. President Donald Trump’s presidential campaign committee refunded at least six LLC donations because it could not determine whether they were legal.

Not all LLCs are shell companies. Some LLCs are easy to identify: Motley Rice LLC, for example, is one of the country’s largest litigation firms. But the human or corporate connections to LLCs with alphabet soup names like BH Group LLC, HFNWA LLC, BV-2 LLC, HGI DB Fund LLC, HGIM LLC or HJK LLC — which made substantial contributions to Trump’s inaugural committee — are harder to pin down.

BH Group LLC acted as a cipher to channel $1 million to Trump’s inaugural committee without disclosing the sources of its funding. The group, formed four months before the donation, has no known public-facing operation. OpenSecrets tracked down the group’s connection to conservative legal activists, but the $1 million gift’s true origins remain unknown.

The Koch brothers have used LLCs to conceal how money moves through their vast network of tax-exempt politically active nonprofits. Known as “disregarded entities,” LLCs in the Koch network are in effect subsidiaries of the network’s 501(c) nonprofits formed under different names, further shielding the sources of funding that’s already difficult for observers to trace.

In recent years, the ever-deadlocked FEC has done little to investigate complaints from advocacy groups that true donors are being hidden behind LLCs.

Foreigners, who are allowed to set up LLCs in the U.S., could hypothetically create a shell company to contribute to U.S. elections. The practice is technically illegal, but observers would have no way to determine where the money originated if the donor is not disclosed.

“A foreign national or a foreign individual or an agent could easily set up an LLC in Delaware, make a contribution and if the true source is not disclosed, the public would have no way of knowing,” Brendan Fischer, federal and FEC reform director at the Campaign Legal Center, told OpenSecrets last year.

Foreign individuals have been caught in attempts to contribute to U.S. elections before. Just last year, the Justice Department sentenced Mexican businessman Jose Susumo Azano Matsura to three years in prison for making illegal campaign contributions totaling almost $600,000 through shell companies and straw donors in San Diego’s 2012 mayoral race.

Perhaps the most publicized instance of foreign spending in U.S. elections came in 1996 when foreigners contributed millions of dollars to the Democratic National Committee (DNC) in an effort by the People’s Republic of China to gain influence in American politics.

The DNC eventually returned more than $2.8 million in contributions it said it believed came from questionable sources, including foreign nationals and straw donors, The Washington Post reported at the time. Much of that money came from fundraisers with ties to China.

Though leaders of the bipartisan Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, which is investigating international meddling in the 2016 elections, have said they have “no doubt” Russia tried to influence races, the scope of foreign influence on U.S. elections through shell companies is unclear.

What is clear, though, is that the number of LLC donations in presidential elections has surged since the Supreme Court’s 2010 Citizens United decision. In 2012, 109 LLCs gave a combined $12 million to presidential candidates and super PACs. Four years later, 840 LLCs would pour a combined $21 million into the 2016 presidential election.

]]>Primary preview: Voters head to the polls in seven states on June 26https://www.opensecrets.org/news/2018/06/primary-preview-voters-head-to-the-polls-in-seven-states-on-june-26/
Wed, 20 Jun 2018 21:22:54 +0000https://www.opensecrets.org/news/?p=26661Former presidential candidate Mitt Romney and convicted U.S. Army leaker Chelsea Manning are among the candidates in Tuesday's primaries.

June 26th will see primaries in New York, Maryland, Oklahoma, Colorado and Utah, as well as runoff races in South Carolina and Mississippi.

A former Republican presidential candidate and a convicted U.S. Army leaker are among the candidates that will appear on ballots next Tuesday as voters in seven states make their primary election picks.

And in the South, voters will head to the polls again in two primary runoffs to determine who will be on their November ballots.

Here’s a look at the money being spent in New York, Maryland, Utah, Colorado, Oklahoma, Mississippi and South Carolina ahead of Tuesday’s primaries:

New York

Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), who is up for re-election to New York’s Senate seat, is running unopposed in Tuesday’s Democratic primary. But the spotlight is on the heated House primaries elsewhere in the state, which includes districts containing the Hudson Valley and parts of New York City.

Seven Democrats are fighting an expensive battle in New York’s 19th District House race to challenge incumbent Rep. John Faso (R-N.Y.) in November. As of June 6, the Democrats have combined spent nearly $5 million on the race, with outside spending groups throwing in another $524,000 ahead of Tuesday’s primary. Iraq War veteran Pat Ryan has received the most support from outside spending groups, who have put roughly $356,000 behind his campaign.

In the 11th District’s Republican primary, incumbent Rep. Dan Donovan (R-N.Y.) is facing a challenge from Michael Grimm, who held the seat before pleading guilty to tax fraud and resigning in 2015. Donovan himself is facing scrutiny for allegedly discussing a potential pardon for Grimm with President Donald Trump.

Donovan is outspending Grimm more than 3 to 1 ahead of the primary. Donovan also has the backing of outside spending groups, who have spent about $484,000 supporting his campaign. The largest of those outside backers is the US Chamber of Commerce, which is a corporate-funded trade association that doesn’t have to disclose its donors.

A super PAC closely aligned with President Trump and his political allies, America First Action, has also pitched in $59,960.

Maryland

Incumbent Sen. Ben Cardin (D-Md.), who has held his Senate seat for decades, is heavily favored to win Tuesday’s Democratic primary, according to a February Goucher College poll. He’s facing seven other Democrats on Tuesday, including Chelsea Manning, a former U.S. Army soldier found guilty of leaking classified information.

Manning has raised just over $81,000, putting her far behind Democratic competitor Jerome Segal, who has raised nearly $1.4 million. Cardin, though, has more than $2.8 million on hand to spend.

Maryland’s 6th District House race will see two crowded primaries on Tuesday, with eight Democrats and four Republicans facing off for a chance to fill Rep. John Delaney’s (D-Md.) seat in November. Delaney announced in 2017 he wouldn’t seek reelection and instead focus on his 2020 presidential bid.

David Trone, the millionaire co-founder of Total Wine & More who’s running in the Democratic primary, has spent more than $10 million of his own money on his campaign, the Washington Post reported. He lost his last bid for the House in 2016 after dropping more than $13 million on his failed campaign.

Candidates in the 6th District primary have proven that money doesn’t always win endorsements. More than two dozen Democratic elected officials in Maryland have endorsed Aruna Miller, one of Trone’s Democratic competitors, the Post reported. She has raised more than $1.3 million.

Utah

Mitt Romney, a former Massachusetts governor and Republican presidential candidate, has been a vocal Trump critic since the mogul’s 2016 campaign. But that does not seem to bother Utah voters, who are expected to pick Romney over state legislator Mike Kennedy in Tuesday’s Republican primary. Tuesday’s winner will face Democrat Jenny Wilson in a race for retiring Sen. Orrin Hatch’s (R-Utah) seat this November.

Romney has far outspent Kennedy and Wilson, pouring nearly $2 million into the race ahead of the primary. Kennedy, the only candidate to get support from outside spending groups, has spent just under $420,000 in his Senate bid.

Colorado

Most of Colorado’s House primaries are competitive, but the 5th and 6th Districts are drawing the most attention.

Rep. Doug Lamborn (R-Colo.), a five-term incumbent, will have to fend off four Republican challengers in the 5th District race on Tuesday if he wants to keep his House seat this fall. Lamborn’s not getting any help from outside spending groups: The Clean Up Congress PAC, a liberal super PAC, has spent $96,000 opposing him.

In the 6th District, two Democrats are facing off to challenge incumbent Rep. Mike Coffman (R-Colo.) in November. Coffman is widely seen as a vulnerable Republican, and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) has selected Jason Crow, one of his Democratic challengers, as part of its “Red to Blue” program to flip House seats this fall.

Crow is up against Levi Tillemann in Tuesday’s Democratic primary. Tillemann has made headlines in recent days for dousing himself with pepper spray in a campaign ad, which YouTube viewers have watched hundreds of thousands of times.

Oklahoma

Four Republicans and two Democrats are battling in Oklahoma’s 1st District House race for an open seat vacated when former Rep. James Bridenstine (R-Okla.) became NASA administrator in April.

Republican Kevin Hern, a McDonald’s franchisee, has raised over $1.3 million — more than all other candidates combined. But he’s stoked the ire of the Club for Growth Action, a conservative super PAC that has spent roughly $272,000 opposing Hern ahead of the primary. And the With Honor Fund, a non-partisan super PAC dedicated to helping veterans win elections, has put just under $200,000 behind one of Hern’s competitors, Republican Andy Coleman.

About half of all money raised in Oklahoma House primaries is from out-of-state donors, Oklahoma Watch reported Monday. The majority of that out-of-state money has gone to GOP incumbents.

Mississippi

Mississippi will hold two runoffs on Tuesday. Two Democrats will face off for a chance to continue in the Senate race, while two Republicans will battle to continue in the 3rd District House race.

Tuesday’s Senate primary runoff will determine whether Democrats Howard Sherman, a venture capitalist, or David Baria, a state legislator, will face incumbent Sen. Roger Wicker (R-M.S.) in November. Sherman leads Baria in fundraising in a primary that has so far been free of outside spending.

In the 3rd District Republican primary runoff, Whit Hughes and Michael Guest are competing to appear on the November ballot against Democratic state legislator Michael Evans. Guest has raised roughly $490,000, while Hughes has raised about $452,000.

South Carolina

Republicans Lee Bright and William Timmons will head to a runoff in South Carolina’s 4th District House race, following a close primary that was decided by only a few hundred votes.

Timmons, who came in second behind Bright in the district’s June 12 primary, edged out Dan Hamilton by only 349 votes.

Though Bright received the majority of the vote on June 12, Timmons received most of the money. The state legislator has raised about $703,000 compared to Bright’s $192,000.

Social welfare organizations like CRES and CLA are not supposed to have politics as their primary purpose, but they can engage in significant political spending without oversight from the IRS or FEC. And because these groups do not have to disclose their donors, they are often referred to as “dark money” groups when they spend in elections.

]]>Pruitt landed wife a job at dark money group backing political allieshttps://www.opensecrets.org/news/2018/06/wife-job-darkmoney-scott-pruitt-scandal/
Fri, 15 Jun 2018 18:08:58 +0000https://www.opensecrets.org/news/?p=26611The Judicial Crisis Network, which temporarily employed Pruitt's wife, has historically given more than $3.3 million to groups affiliated with the EPA chief.

As Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Scott Pruitt’s list of scandals continues to grow, one nonprofit at the center of one of the latest controversies is noteworthy for donating millions of dollars to groups associated with Pruitt while he served as Oklahoma’s attorney general.

The Judicial Crisis Network (JCN), a 501(c)(4) organization that has historically donated more than $3.3 million to groups affiliated with Pruitt, temporarily employed the EPA chief’s wife, Marlyn, after Pruitt enlisted an aide’s help in finding her a job, the Washington Post reported Wednesday. Pruitt and the aide reportedly solicited Republican donors and conservatives connected to the Trump administration while hunting for jobs, raising questions about Pruitt’s compliance with federal ethics rules.

The scandal is one of the latest in a series of controversies involving the EPA chief, who has also been scrutinized for installing a $43,000 soundproof booth in his office, spending taxpayer money on first-class air travel and living in a condo owned by a lobbyist whose husband lobbied the EPA, among other things.

On Friday, the New York Times reported that Pruitt also asked for staff’s help in getting tickets to the Rose Bowl and obtaining a White House internship for his daughter, among other personal matters.

Republican legislators, including Sens. James Inhofe (R-Okla.), Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) and Joni Ernst (R-Iowa), said they were frustrated by Pruitt’s actions following Wednesday’s Post report. Laura Ingraham, a prominent conservative talk show host, criticized Pruitt’s judgment in a tweet Wednesday.

The JCN, the group at the center of one of the EPA chief’s most recent scandals, is a nonprofit that has worked to push the appointment of conservative judges, including Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch. President Donald Trump appointed Gorsuch to the Supreme Court in 2017.

In 2013, the JCN began giving what would become more than $2.4 million in donations over three years to the Republican Attorneys General Association while Pruitt chaired the organization, the Post reported. The JCN also gave $885,000 to the Rule of Law Defense Fund, which Pruitt launched as a Republican attorneys general public policy organization. And in 2016, the nonprofit gave $25,000 to one of Pruitt’s PACs.

The Post reported that Pruitt has spoken at recent gatherings for the Federalist Society, a conservative legal organization connected to the JCN. Leonard Leo, the Federalist Society’s executive vice president, is a friend of Pruitt’s who helped connect his wife with the JCN, according to the Post.

Leo arranged and initially paid for several events and meals Pruitt attended while on a June 2017 trip to Rome, the New York Times reported. Those events included a private Mass at the Vatican and a meal that reportedly cost several hundred dollars per person. Pruitt later reimbursed Leo for the meals, according to the Post.

Leo also appears to be connected to a mysterious company that was one of the largest donors to Trump’s inaugural committee, OpenSecrets reported in May. BH Group, LLC, which Leo listed as his employer on a campaign finance disclosure, gave $1 million to the committee. Little is known about BH Group, other than that it has a virtual office in Northern Virginia and an apparent connection to a conservative law firm that specializes in campaign finance compliance.

Tax forms revealed that BH Group received $750,000 from the Wellspring Committee, a nonprofit that is one of the JCN’s largest funders. The payment, according to tax forms, was for public relations services, though the Wellspring Committee does not appear to have any public operations.

Pruitt’s personal connections to Leo span as early as 2013, when Pruitt was Oklahoma’s attorney general. Pruitt and Leo worked together to challenge Obama administration domestic policies, the Post reported.

Two nonprofit groups with reported links to the energy industry funneled thousands of dollars of dark money into South Carolina’s 4th District House race in an apparent effort to boost GOP candidates ahead of Tuesday’s crowded primary.

CRES spent more than $56,000 supporting Republican candidate William Timmons since the beginning of June, according to Federal Election Commission (FEC) filings.

And CLA spent more than $50,000 in the South Carolina race last Thursday, according to the FEC. The group spent roughly half that money supporting GOP candidate Josh Kimbrell, while the other half went to oppose Lee Bright, another Republican candidate in the 4th District race.

The two nonprofits’ forays into the South Carolina race came just weeks before Tuesday’s primary, where 13 Republican candidates battled for a chance to replace Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.). Gowdy announced his retirement from Congress earlier this year.

CLA’s efforts to back Kimbrell appear to have failed. Bright and Timmons knocked Kimbrell and the other 10 GOP candidates out of the race on Tuesday and will go head-to-head in a runoff for the Republican spot on June 26, the Post and Courier reported.

CRES and CLA both have ties to the energy industry and policy. CRES works to engage Republicans in clean energy policy, while CLA’s treasurer is a lobbyist for an Ohio-based electric company.

CRES announced it would back Timmons in early June, citing his support for pro-solar energy policy as a South Carolina state legislator. The Huffington Post reported in 2015 that CRES received money from two nonprofits often linked to groups that support liberal causes. Similar to CRES, neither of those groups — the Advocacy Fund and the Trust for Energy Innovation — have disclosed its donors.

James Dozier, CRES’s president, told the Huffington Post at the time that 800 donors and 5,000 conservation activists supported the group.

CRES spent more than $1.5 and $1.4 million in the 2014 and 2016 election cycles, respectively. In 2018 federal elections, the nonprofit has only reported spending in the South Carolina primary.

Little is known about CLA. Its primary purpose, it states on its website, is to “put conservative policies into action.”

Marc Himmelstein, CLA’s treasurer, has worked for years as a lobbyist for an Ohio-based electric company called FirstEnergy, the Center for Public Integrity reported in May. FirstEnergy has given National Environmental Strategies — Himmelstein’s firm — $640,000 since 2010, according to the center. The firm shares a Washington, D.C. address with CLA.

CLA spent $56,500 opposing Republican House candidate and Ohio legislator Christina Hagan in the state’s 16th District primary last May, after she declined to support a bill lobbied by FirstEnergy, the Center for Public Integrity reported. Hagan told the center she believed the bill, which would have boosted FirstEnergy’s income by $300 million annually, was unfair to its customers. She lost the primary to Anthony Gonzalez, a former NFL football player that CLA spent another $56,500 supporting.

CLA has spent roughly $934,000 on races during the 2018 election cycle. About 58 percent of those expenditures went into South Carolina’s 5th District special election in 2017.